Enter Time Machine

Make sure that your Time Machine backup disk is connected and turned on.

Open a window that contains—or once contained—the item that you want to restore. For example, to restore a file that was deleted from your Documents folder, start by opening the Documents folder. Or if you're using an app that automatically saves versions of documents as you work on them, open any version of that document.

Choose Enter Time Machine from the Time Machine menu . This example shows Time Machine for the Documents folder:

Find the items to restore:

Use the timeline on the edge of the screen to see the items in your Time Machine backup as they were at that date and time. The timeline might also include local snapshots.

Use the onscreen up and down arrows to jump to the last time the contents of the window changed. You can also use the search field in a window to find an item, then move through time while focused on changes to that item.

Select an item and press Space Bar to preview it and make sure it's the one you want.

Click Restore to restore the item you selected, or Control-click the item for other options.